The Juno Dichotomy
by ziparumpazoo
Summary: Musings on the nature of motherhood in two universes. Spoilers for S1 and S3's Bloodlines.
1. Blue

_Blue_

Olivia remembers telling Rachel that she wanted a baby. It was during some phone conversation, not long after she'd started seeing John, and Rachel was telling her about Ella's latest escapades. Something about a stunt her precocious niece had pulled at pre-school, but despite the call for an early pick-up and a trip to the emergency room, Rachel's voice was so full of warmth and love for her little girl that it left Olivia feeling hollowed out, as if she'd been assembled a few parts short. Like a certain sense of purpose was missing from her life.

Rachel had laughed. "Liv, you do not want to be worrying about trying to balance daycare and sleepless nights with your career. With your schedule, the late pick-up fees alone would kill you."

Olivia had just shrugged it off and agreed, because Rachel was right. She loved her job. She'd worked hard to get where she was and she was good at it. She wasn't just going to put it aside while she settled down with Mr. Right and set up house. The FBI doesn't wait on mid-life crises. If she was being honest with herself, it wasn't really a baby she wanted; it was that feeling of belonging to something bigger and more important than herself. She yearned for that vibe of contentment she always got from Rachel. She wanted to stop drifting, to find her anchor… her home.

Then John was injured and her world was flipped upside down and inside out. And then he was dead and she had to acknowledge that maybe she'd been careless the last few times she'd been with him. The notion that she might be carrying some small piece of him was both terrifying and exhilarating. Being in love does funny things; she hadn't had any intention of getting pregnant, just the conviction that if she did with John… well, she was hitting her thirties and there were worse things that could happen to her.

She just hadn't imagined how much worse. She found herself being pulled into a world of abominations and atrocities, of espionage and double-crosses. A dangerous and sometimes terrifying world that became so all-consuming that there was often little room in her life for three meals a day, let alone a tiny person who would depend on her for even the most basic of necessities.

When she woke the morning after the funeral to the familiar ache in her belly, it was also with a guilty sense of relief. And as much as she would have liked to have been able to ease some of Mrs. Scott's grief at losing her son, Olivia felt a bit of weight fall from her shoulders.

Because when she wasn't looking, her purpose had come and found her.

And maybe she can blame it on all of Walter's talk about roads not taken and choices not made, but there are still times, especially when she's tucking that precocious niece of hers into bed with a storybook and a kiss, that she still wonders '_what if…_'


	2. Red

_Red_

Olivia never wanted kids. Frank would bring it up from time to time, would try to tempt her with the idea of their little progeny running around with his brains and her looks, but she'd just laugh it off.

"It'll never work," she'd tell him. "Not between all the travel for your job, and the hours Broyles has us working at mine. The kid won't know whether it's coming or going."

But Frank hadn't been there when they'd lost Rachel and the baby. Olivia had never told him anything about it, other than, "I have a sister. She died a few years back during childbirth." And then she'd change the subject. Frank probably would've understood, to a degree; viral pathology _is_ one of his specialties. But Rachel's memory isn't something she shares with just anyone and she's still not too sure how serious this thing with Frank is. Maybe in time.

Time runs out. She's confronted with living proof of her slight miscalculation, her lapse in judgment, her inability to accept failure as the outcome of the mission; all frozen in black and white on the tiny screen in the back of the ambulance.

Frank leaves her and she doesn't blame him in the slightest. Sure, it hurts that he splits. He cleans out the apartment, and leaves her with little more than a few empty boxes and some packing peanuts as a farewell note, but she doesn't blame him. She also doesn't think about him much either. She doesn't have the capacity to wonder about could've-beens, not when her mind is constantly short-circuited by thoughts like _'I'll have the virus. I can't have this baby. It'll be like with Rachel all over again. I've got the virus and if I have this baby, we're both going to die._'

Her mother tries to convince her otherwise, tries to focus on the positive as she grasps at the slimmest of odds, but in her heart, Olivia's already making her peace with it. She can't have this baby. She won't _ever_ have babies of her own, but she has plenty of other things in her life to fill that space. Maybe she'll get a dog.

Then, biology is tricked and time sped up, and in the short moments between Lincoln's frantic encouragements and Henry's even voice talking her through the pain, Olivia thinks, '_So this is what it's like to know you're dying_'. Because she truly believes that she is. She can't see how she could not be; not when she feels like she's being split in half and crushed from the inside out.

It's too fast and she's not prepared for it, not mentally, although her body has decided otherwise. And so she gives everything she's got. Pushes until she can feel every muscle trembling and all she can see are spots. Because if she can just get this child out of her alive… if Lincoln can make sure he's safe, then maybe her mother won't be left completely alone.

His feeble cries nearly stop her heart.

She forgets to breathe.

It's not until she's been secured in the back of the ambulance (and isn't _that_ ironic - her introduction and re-introduction to this little creature has a running theme) with the baby tucked against her chest and the both of them wrapped in layers of blankets for warmth, that reality hits.

She has a son.

His little chest rises and falls under her hand and his head lifts and bobs as his mouth seeks her out, trying to satisfy his instinct to suckle. It's so normal and natural after everything that's happened in the last twenty-four hours that she feels the tears welling up again. She can't help it. He's here. He's whole and alive, and so is she. She has a son and he's the most beautiful thing she's ever held, even in all his swollen and sticky glory.

"Hey there kiddo," she whispers as she strokes the delicate curve of his ear. She marvels at how he burrows his nose into her neck at the sound of her voice. She's never felt this _connected_ to something so much bigger than herself. It's at that moment that she knows without a doubt, if it meant his survival, she _would_ die for him.

Without hesitation.


End file.
